Chapter 653

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After the heavy rain, a trace of pure blue sky emerged from the dense dark clouds. Sunlight pierced through the gap, as breathtaking as a divine blessing descending from heaven.

Qian Dafu looked up at the sky and said, “Your Imperial Majesty, the sky seems to be clearing. We can go out. I will call Zhao Long and Zhao Hu.”

Xiao Ming nodded upon hearing this. He then went back to change into casual clothes. For him, he still didn’t want to make a big show of walking outside; wearing dragon robes would be too conspicuous.

Moreover, he had grown accustomed to frequently visiting inside and outside the city during his time in Qingzhou. Spending every day in the traveling palace was quite difficult.

On his way back to the bedchamber, he stopped by to check on Fei Yuer. The girl was very sleepy now; his movements while changing clothes didn’t even wake her.

Preventing Xiao Huan from waking Fei Yuer, Xiao Ming left the traveling palace alone and headed south of the city under the protection of his guards.

For Xiao Ming, the ideal capital would naturally be Youzhou. However, for now, Youzhou was temporarily unsuitable as the capital. After all, Youzhou was currently impoverished, and its urban infrastructure was very poor.

According to Pang Yukun, although it was called a prefecture, it was actually inferior to even a county in Qingzhou.

So, after careful consideration, Xiao Ming still intended to make Qingzhou the capital for now, and only consider relocating the capital after Youzhou had developed, which he estimated would take about twenty to thirty years.

“Your Imperial Majesty, it’s quite lively outside, and our Qingzhou is becoming even more bustling.” Qian Dafu said with a smile, which made his already small eyes narrow into a slit.

Zhao Long said, “Those who come are merchants and powerful families. They are very shrewd. They know that His Imperial Majesty is invincible, and Qingzhou is as stable as a mountain, so there will be no war.”

“It’s not just merchants and powerful families. There have also been more vagrants outside the city recently. The government office has set up many porridge distribution points outside the city,” Zhao Hu added.

Compared to before, the two were now even more high-spirited. After all, they were no longer princely guards, but imperial guards, which made many Qingzhou army soldiers envious. In the past, many people were unwilling to take on such a relaxed duty.

Xiao Ming now felt somewhat like a person who had spent half a year in a detention center and was then released. Since his enthronement, he found that his freedom of movement was far less than before.

His daily itinerary basically consisted of the council hall, the study, and the bedchamber. The various affairs of Qingzhou City were all reported to him by officials, and he also conveyed decrees through Qian Dafu.

Suddenly, he had become a canary in a cage. Xiao Ming felt an instinctive wariness towards this confined environment.

Having read many historical records, he knew very well that this was how emperors throughout history were misled by powerful officials and eunuchs around them, because everything he knew came from the mouths of others.

He could only listen to what others said. As a result, he would naturally receive a lot of inaccurate information and information tainted with the powerful officials’ personal views.

However, Xiao Ming was also prepared for this situation. This was the Secret Guard, which served as his eyes outside.

However, the Secret Guard also had its limitations. In an era where transportation largely relied on walking and communication largely relied on shouting, the limited Secret Guard personnel were mostly used to monitor important figures, and generally, the lives of the common people could not be timely reported.

Based on this, he had been thinking for the past two days about how to obtain authentic information. After much thought, he concluded that only by making the newspaper office a source of impartial reporting could this problem be solved.

Just as Niu Ben worried that Xiao Ming would let the powerful families gain power, it was now an obvious fact that every official and general had their own ideas and considerations.

For the military, he could only consider the nationalization of the army.

Of course, the nationalization of the army was a false proposition. For him, the essence of the nationalization of the army was the royalization of the army, to ensure his absolute leadership over the army, and to prevent generals from turning the army into their private forces.

After all, in the future, his army would contend with Western powers for colonies. He did not want his generals to establish themselves after occupying a colony.

As for officials, besides having two factions in court to supervise each other, he also planned to adopt a top-down supervision model.

This model was the newspaper he thought of. After all, contemporary facts proved that media exposure played a very good role in exposing official corruption and also helped supervise officials.

The only drawback was that Qingzhou currently had only one newspaper office, which would make some newspaper articles too subjective. So, he planned to establish two more newspaper offices in Qingzhou and open two of them to merchants.

That is to say, there would be three official newspaper offices and two private ones in Qingzhou. In this way, diversified competition would uncover some hidden scandals.

Thinking about the things he needed to tackle next, the group unconsciously arrived in the south of the city. At this moment, a cluster of buildings, under the labor of the construction department, was gradually taking shape.

He cared quite a bit about this imperial palace, where he might live for twenty or thirty years in the future. So, the design of the imperial palace was basically from his own hand, including not only formal buildings but also secret tunnels and the like.

Of course, the original intention of the design was to give this imperial palace some modern flair. Therefore, the construction of this imperial palace heavily utilized brick and wood structures. This structure, compared to pure wood structures, was much sturdier and also saved a lot of construction time.

After all, building walls with red bricks was much simpler than a carpenter’s work, and among these red bricks, he also had artisans pre-install ceramic pipes, which would be used for wiring in the future.

It was precisely based on this simple yet ancient design that the construction speed of the imperial palace was unprecedented. At this rate, it could be moved into in just eight months. At a normal speed, an imperial palace would take no less than five or even ten years to build.

“Your Imperial Majesty, this construction department is truly excellent. I have never seen an imperial palace built to such a state in such a short time.”

At this time, the city walls and palace gates of the imperial palace had already been built, and the city walls were also dyed red. The group entered through the palace gate. In front was a flight of steps that led up to the Zhengda Guangming Hall (Hall of Grand Rectitude), the main hall.

This Zhengda Guangming Hall was where the imperial court would convene. It was named Zhengda Guangming to constantly remind the officials.

Compared to Chang’an’s luxurious imperial palace, Xiao Ming’s demands for his own imperial palace were simplicity. So he didn’t ask for white jade steps or anything like that. Anything that could be sourced locally was used.

Beyond the Zhengda Guangming Hall were the living quarters for the imperial concubines, each with its own small courtyard. To the right of the imperial palace was the Ministry of Internal Affairs, where the eunuchs resided, and to the left was the East Palace.

Overall, the general layout of his imperial palace was somewhat similar to that of Chang’an’s imperial palace, but there were also differences, such as the boiler water tower erected within the imperial palace.

And just as Xiao Ming was inspecting his future palace, a drastic change quietly swept through Yan.